Business as Usual

Remember Obama’s promise of  “I will go line by line and cut projects that are too costly or don’t work” (paraphrasing)? It’s time to step up to the plate man because the Senate almost passed a $410 billion bill with more pork stuffed in it than a Dunkin Donuts has cops(bu-dum-bump). The Republicans, to my suprise, were one vote shy of having the bill passed through the Senate and onto BO’s desk. I’m skeptical that the reason the bill didn’t pass (yet) is because of the Republican’s disciplined conservative princpiles about not spending more dough on earmarks and pork but rather because they’re grandstanding and negotiating that final vote for more concessions (ie money). If the Republicans were serious about being “conservative”, how did the vote come so close unless to tease the Dems? Niener-Niener-Niener, you aren’t getting the porkwiener.

What upsets me more about this is what Obama said, but more importantly what he didnt say earlier this week. BO outlined a plan that would cut defense spending by $40 billion. Sounding as if he were still campaiging to be the Pres, BO’s plan was to have more over sight, more competition, more reform, and no more no-bid contracts. This certainly caught my attention since he was talking about something that affects my livelihood. Although I agree that some programs are too costly (F-22, even though it’s so cool), I disagree about the need for more oversight, especially for non-in-theater programs (I can’t think of a better way to say, programs that aren’t directly fighting/supporting the war). In fact, all the oversight is the reason why programs are overrun because everything needs to go through so much scrutiny, aka process. Take for example the tanker deal that went kaput. The competition started four years ago (?) and we STILL don’t have a tanker! How much more oversight and competition can there be?! I’m sure the competition has cost everyone, including the taxpayers, millions of dollars. Thank goodness for all that oversight.

But all that ranting from me is a digression from my original point of why I’m upset. If BO wants to come down with a hammer on wasteful defense spending, that is alright with me but he better bring a sledgehammer to domestic spending programs like “pig odor research” or “honey bee labs” that’s stuffed into the spending bill. Let me save those programs some money and suspense; pigs smell but they’re real tasty and bees don’t need a lab, they don’t need to conduct science experiments. I haven’t heard a peep out of the White House about how much crap is in that bill and how it needs to be trimmed. Instead, everyday is another day where some bank/industry gets bailout money and ridiculous spending bills get passed.

It’s frustrating but I do have a solution; try to get a piece of the pie by coming up with some ridiculous ass research program like the mating habits of the striped desert gecko. If you can’t beat em, join em.